Oracle
by Chiaroscuro
Summary: [Incomplete] Later chapters will chronicle Tsuzuki's early days as a Shinigami - perhaps up to the point at which he meets Hisoka. What have I gotten myself into? ;


Oracle: A Yami no Matsuei Fic  
  
Author's Notes: This story was given rise after I scrounged through history to find something suitable. I'm putting an enormous amount of work into this, and I hope the effort will result in something good. Ghosts from the Ashes is another "fic-in-progress" that will take place in this storyline as well. Ghosts will acutually be a gift to one of my friends, Elyra-chan. Go read her fics...now. They're much better than mine. ^^ Also, the poem below is formatted like so: English / Japanese. This way you can see both the translation and the original.  
  
Principle/Warnings: Tsuzuki's unanswered past, as well as his early days as a Shinigami. Written from Tsuzuki's POV. Warnings for bs'ing of Tsuzuki's history, OC's (needed a few early partners for Tsuzuki ^^;), and a few spoilers...I think. This'll need a lot of revision - so I'll be glad of any comments/criticisms about Japanese culture, history, location, etc. I'm not even going to try to use Japanese languages or phrases. Rest assured, I appreciate any constructive comments or criticisms made in reviews.   
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Yami no Matsuei - rest assured, you'd hate it if I did - and this fanfiction was made purely for my own enjoyment, and that of other fans. No money/profit involved at all. Remind me why I write these, again? ^^; This is also a work of fiction - historical fiction, as most of the places and events are real - and any character resemblence to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.  
  
------- Prologue: A Gathering of Omens -------  
  
My companion in the skies / Tsure mo ari  
  
of death, / imawa no sora no  
  
a cuckoo. / hototogisu  
  
--Fufu  
  
-------  
  
September 1, 1923 - 11:58 AM  
  
"I had scarcely returned to my desk when, without warning, came the first rumbling jar of an earthquake, a sickening sway, the vicious grinding of timbers and, in a few seconds, a crescendo of turmoil as the floor began to heave and the building to lurch drunkenly.... The ground could scarcely be said to shake; it heaved, tossed and leapt under one. The walls bulged as if made of cardboard and the din became awful...For perhaps half a minute the fabric of our surroundings held; then came disintegration. Slabs of plaster left the ceilings and fell about our ears, filling the air with a blinding, smothering fog of dust. Walls bulged, spread and sagged, pictures danced on their wires, flew out and crashed to splinters. ... How long it lasted, I don't know. It seemed an eternity; but the official record says four minutes.."   
  
----Otis Manchester Poole, Manager of Dodwell & Co. Ltd. in Yokohama  
  
-------  
  
All my life I have been labeled as a son of demons. My eyes have marked me so in the scrutiny of my peers. It was only recently that I began to believe the words that were whispered behind my back, a multitude of barbed speculations that embedded themselves within the thin shell of my feigned happiness. As a child I could never understand exactly why the parents of my playmates cast such withering looks in my direction. I could only feel the confused hurt of an innocent, unaware at what I had done to earn the wrath of people who should have been my friends and neighbors. It was as if they could sense me, a serpent, as a malignant presence among their innocent flock. My elder sister, Ruka, did what she could to cheer me up - teaching me to dance and to cook. It is her memory that I hold onto now, as I sink into a darkness punctuated with the roar of the world around me...and the cries of pain and terror that echo on the air.  
  
The inky depths of my nightmares are pierced only with the brief and blinding rays of transient feeling. One moment there is pain, the next a feeling of weightlessness, and when I wake I am lying in a drab hospital bed with no memory of how I came to be there...only a feeling of anger so intensely violent that it made me ill even in recollection. The bed feels thin and uncomfortable, obviously erected in haste. It is no more than a cot, and it feels as if it can barely sustain my weight. The sordid hospital around me is bustling with frenzied activity, and I am only one man amongst a long line of the injured. I pause to wonder why so many people are here... They line the walls in every direction, and some of the injured even lie upon futons scattered seemingly at random on the cold floors. Random...just as the scattered memories that torment me return. Each flash of image comes out of order, and makes my head ache with confusion. The hurried conversation of the doctors and nurses is rife with words like "earthquake," "fire," and "death." It is then that I know. Everything comes flooding back to me in a rush, every horrible, flame-soaked detail. I wish I could forget, and I wish that I could lapse into senselessness and never wake. Waking to this torture is too much for me. Somehow my ties to the living world are too strong, but still my guilt and anguish are too great. I can sense that my bonds to this world are weaker than my desire to die, and I know even now that they will dissolve.  
  
It was my fault...all of it. I close my eyes as if to ward off the images that I know are coming, even though the action is hopelessly futile. The visons come anyway. I don't even know what they mean. All I know is that I have caused it to happen, and I dare not ponder the reason for my anger - lest it boil forth and consume me again. My rage had devoured what logic remained to me, and then something within my mind had strained against a control I never realized that I had developed. It broke free at last, and was accompanied with a violent lurch of both the ground and my mental perceptions. The ground writhed beneath my feet as the Earth gave birth to something so powerful that the air shuddered with its presence. Flame had danced along the edges of my vision, scorching my surroundings with a heat so intense that it was amazing I had survived. The ground had cracked, and the room had burnt away to nothing but cinders. I sink back into a sleep ridden with the worst sort of nightmares - those that are true.  
  
The next three years are a blur to me. I exist in a state of suspension, and only the memories of that morning remain to sink through to me. Each breath I take seems as if I am attempting to take oxygen from water, and the pressure of my emotions has begun to drown me. I've attempted to end my life a multitude of times now, and I am aware enough to realize that the doctors have labeled me as "insane." Somehow I am amused by this. I realize now that I am no human. I heal too quickly, and I can sense things that no real human ever could. I feel each of the 140,000 deaths as a distinct blow to my already battered soul. I do not know what I am anymore, but that question seems insignificant now. I want to know what it is that I had done - perhaps "unleashed" is the better word - upon the unsuspecting city of Tokyo. I cannot remember how I became so angry that the raw power of my fury could make itself manifest. That day was my end of innocence. Any scrap that I had once posessed had been burned away and utterly destroyed.  
  
I have always held innocence as something sacred and inviolate. My gardens reminded me of this every day, and it was a pleasure to care for them. The most demanding of my charges were the bonsai - small plants or bushes trained to resemble fully mature trees. It was a form of art for me. Each trimming and graft of a branch was carefully planned, and I always took the utmost care to ensure that the bonsai suffered the least amount of distress as possible. Ruka used to smile at me as she watched me work with my little trees, so carefully gentle with each of them. Ruka...her name brings back so many childhood dreams that I have lost. A painful flash of memory momentarily blinds me of all other thoughts. Dear God... I know now the reason for my anger. I have to end it now...before I can kill anyone else! A sort of detachment washes over me as I realize that this time I have succeeded. I watch as my blood flows, unrestrained, and I sink into what I hope will be a permanent oblivion. The blood of 140,000 stains me, and it feels as if I have been bathing in it. My soul has been too blackened with the ashes of innocents, and I have caused too much pain in this world to deserve anything but the deepest circles of Hell. Imagine my surprise when I am proved correct.  
  
-----   
  
A/N: Much as I love the idea, I need reviewer support before I embark upon something of this magnitude. I live for reviews! ^^ If you'd like to see this continued, then please leave a comment. I'm still a little edgy about actually writing something...long. If I do continue it, it will definitely have more elements of humor, etc. - although it is mainly a "serious" work. 


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